WANGSHAW'S Bank was one of the institutions of Netherfield. It was older than the oldest inhabitant. It dated from that far-away, misty epoch, when the great-grandsires of those who now did business with it walked those narrow streets with peruke and sword and buckled shoes, and when the talk yet lingered in men's mouths of the wild music heard in the distance as Prince Charles and his Highlanders marched southward through the hills on their road to Derby.

      It was a substantial red-brick mansion, with stone facings, and was situate towards the lower end of High Street, which was the main artery of the town. It was supported on both sides by houses of lesser pretensions, indeed, than itself, both in size and architectural dignity, but still sufficiently genteel and comfortable to be the homes of well-to-do middle-class families. In those olden days the bank had been the home of the Wangshaws, as well as their place of business; but for the last twenty years the family, consisting of two brothers only, Hosea and Jeremiah, had resided at Dulce House, three miles away; and no sight was more familiar to the inhabitants of Netherfield than that of the Wangshaw carriage-roomy, comfortable, old-fashioned — on its way to and from the bank.

      In the bank itself there was no lack of space and comfort, now that the firm had found another home. The whole of the ground floor, together with a large portion of the cellarage, was needed for business purposes. The rooms on the first floor were chiefly used as receptacles for the books and documents having relation to past transactions of the firm. On this same floor was a bedroom and a small sitting-room, for the use of the junior clerk of the establishment, who, from time immemorial, had been required to reside on the premises. A storey higher were the private apartments of Matthew Backhouse, head-porter to Wangshaw Brothers, and son and grandson of defunct head-porters who had lived and died in the service of the firm. Matthew was a widower, but he had one child, a daughter, Martha, who had just entered on her twentieth year when she comes before us.

      A fair-haired, pleasant-tempered girl was Martha Backhouse, with manners and appearance that were superior to her position. She had been carefully educated at the expense of her godfather, Hosea Wangshaw, with whom, as also with his brother, she was a great favourite. Martha might have had a wide choice of suitors, even in a small town like Netherfield, for there was a rumour abroad — whence propagated no one could have told — that she was not forgotten in her godfather's will but her affections were in the safe keeping of Will Trafford, a young man living at Dipplewade, a small town twelve miles away. Every second Sunday Will walked over to Netherfield, to spend the day with his beloved, and trudged the twelve long miles back again at night, for there was neither rail nor coach between the two towns.

      Mr. Harry Dacres, the junior clerk who resided on the premises, was a pleasant scapegrace of twenty, whose natural inclination for sowing an unlimited quantity of "wild oats" was in some measure restrained by a sense of the responsibilities of his position, and by the need of his keeping in what he called the "good books" of Wangshaw Brothers. After office hours, Mr. Harry Dacres, Matthew Backhouse, and his daughter, remained the sole inmates of the old mansion. There was an inferior being in a faded livery, who cleaned out the offices and attended to the fires, but he never by any chance slept on the premises.

      When Christmas Day falls on a Saturday, which was the case with that particular Christmas with which we have now to do, it is so far convenient that it affords hard-worked people two whole days' cessation from business. Mr. Harry Dacres, considering himself as one of the hard-worked, did not fail to ask for, and obtain, a four days' holiday wherewith to recruit his exhausted energies. Harry was going to his home, forty miles away. He was to start by the 4 P.M. train on Christmas Eve; but he little dreamed, as he nodded a smiling farewell to his brother clerks, that he stood under the roof of Wangshaw Brothers for the last time.

      At the last stroke of five, Matthew took down his heavy bunch of keys, and began the solemn ceremonial of locking up the bank. The usual Christmas turkey and half-dozen of port had been sent in by the firm. The usual crisp five-pound note had been pressed into his unreluctant palm. Therefore was the soul of Matthew supremely content; and as he plodded with his bunch of keys from one room to another, he whistled softly to himself, and had pleasant anticipatory visions of the morrow's feast. When he had seen that everything was properly secured, he went upstairs and had a cheerful cup of tea with his daughter. After tea he strolled down to the "White Hart," to enjoy his evening pipe and glass of grog — more than one glass probably, but all in a sedate and solemnly convivial fashion; for Matthew, in his most abandoned moments, never forgot the responsibilities with which he was entrusted by Wangshaw Brothers.

      It was close upon eleven when he got back to the Bank. Martha, as usual, opened the door in answer to his tug at the house-bell. She had been busy all the evening with her preparations for the morrow's festival, to which her sweetheart was invited. Late as it was, there was one task still to do; so her father sat and smoked a last pipe in the chimney-corner, while she decorated the room with mistletoe and holly. She had just done, and was pausing with some surplus sprays of greenery in her hands to mark the effect of her labours, when both she and her father were startled by an imperative ring at the bell, followed immediately by a loud knocking.

      Matthew withdrew his pipe from his mouth, and turned a slow, startled look on his daughter; but before he had time to say a word, Martha was speeding downstairs in answer to the summons. She was back again in a couple of minutes, looking very pale and excited.

      "A telegram, father, from London," she said. "I hope it contains no bad news."

      "Read it, girl," said Matthew, with a solemn wave of his pipe.

      Martha tore open the envelope, and read as under:—

      "Poor dear grandmother!" said Martha, with tears in her eyes.

      "Eighty-three, come seventh of next May. A great age — a very great age," said Matthew, gravely, as he knocked the ashes out of his pipe. "The up mail is due here at 12.30. Get me my coat and my bag ready, and put me a drop of brandy into a little bottle. Eighty-three — a great age!"

      When it was time for her father to start, Martha went downstairs with him to let him out, and to fasten the door behind him. On the step he kissed her, and gave her a few final directions.

      "Look well after the keys, girl," he said. "If I should not be back by Monday morning, you can open the place just as well as I can, and you will explain to the firm the reason of my being away."

      Martha watched her father up the frosty street till he turned a corner and was lost to view. Then she crept back indoors, tearful and sad at heart; and after bolting and rebolting the massive side-door, she went slowly upstairs, and so into the cheerful sitting-room, whose decorations now seemed such a mockery, and shut the door behind her. Although midnight had struck some time ago, she felt in no humour for bed. She was not in the least afraid. She was affected by no superstitious tremors at the thought of having to pass the night all alone in that grim old mansion. Her pulse beat equably; her nerves were unmoved. Her thoughts were with the poor dying old woman, whom she had not seen since she was quite a child. She followed her father, in imagination, on his long, dark journey to that great city whither she had never been. If she could only have gone with him! But that was merely the wish of a moment, gone almost as soon as conceived. Then, with a sigh, she thought how changed the morrow would be from the merry little festival which she had been looking forward to for weeks. To be sure, dear Will would be there by ten o'clock at the latest; but how could they two enjoy themselves with her father away, and on such an errand? This thought of Will brought to mind the last letter he had written her, and in what loving language it was couched. It would do her good to read it once more. She crossed the floor, and unlocked her workbox, and took out the letter. Then she went back to the fire-light, for her candle had died out some time ago, and she had not cared to light another; and kneeling on the hearth-rug, she read over, by the fitful blaze, words which she already knew by heart.

      She was still kneeling, with the letter between her fingers, gazing into the slowly dying embers, when a low sound struck her ear which thrilled every nerve in her body with a sudden terror, and paralyzed for a moment or two every faculty save that of listening. The sound she had heard was the creaking of a loose plank on the landing, immediately below that on which the bank-porter's rooms were situate. It was a sound that had been familiar to her ears for the last half-dozen years. Her father had often talked about having the plank properly fastened down, but it had never been done. On one point Martha was as positive as she was of her own existence: that the plank never creaked except when some one walked across it. Whose foot was it that had pressed it just now? That was the question which she put to herself in breathless terror — she, a lone girl in that weird old house, and the time an hour after midnight. She turned a white, set face and staring eyes full on the shut door, expecting momentarily to see it opened from without. She was listening as she had never listened before for a repetition of the sound that had so startled her. But all was silent, with a silence as of the grave. She could hear the straining beat of her own heart. At the end of a minute, that had seemed as long as an ordinary hour, she rose slowly, and as it were mechanically, to her feet. On the table were an unlighted candle and a box of matches. She struck a match, and lighted the candle. Then, with the candlestick held aloft in her right-hand, and with her left pressed against her beating heart, she slowly crossed the floor. She hesitated for a moment when she reached the door, and the uplifted candlestick trembled in her hand. Then, with a sudden burst of resolution, she turned the handle, and flung the door wide open.

      She flung wide the door, and saw before her two masked figures, who, unheard by her, had crept up the carpeted stairs. She had scarcely time to cry, "Who are you?" before they sprang at her. Her light was dashed to the ground; their arms were wound round her, and held her like a vice; and a stern voice whispered in her ear —

      "Make the slightest noise, and you are a dead woman. Do as you are told, and no harm shall befall you."

      As if to add emphasis to these words, Martha, with a shudder, felt the cold barrel of a pistol pressed against her forehead.

      "Only release me, and tell me what it is you wish me to do!"

      Her voice sounded strange in her own ears.

      "Let go of her, and strike a light," said he who had first spoken to the other.

      The second one did as he was told, and the one who seemed the leader so far followed his companion's example as to take his arms from around Martha, and to hold her merely by a firm grip of the wrist.

      "Beware!" he said, menacingly. "Do not attempt to deceive me, or to play off any tricks upon me, or ——" The click of his pistol finished the sentence more forcibly than any words could have done. As soon as the candle was relighted, Martha had an opportunity of examining her captors more closely. Their faces were covered with black crape veils, in which were cut holes for eyes and mouth. They were dressed in two uniform suits of dark grey, almost like prison suits, and were shod with some soft material that deadened the sound of their footsteps.

      Through all Martha's terror a vivid feeling of wonder was at work in her mind as to the means by which these two unknown men had obtained admission into the bank. She could only conclude that they must have crept in, unseen by any one, and have afterwards secreted themselves in one of the empty rooms below stairs; although how such a thing should have been undetected by her father, whose daily careful examination of the premises was well known to her, was a mystery which just now she was unable to fathom.

      Not much time was allowed her for surmise. A remark from the second man recalled her thoughts to the scene before her.

      "Here's a bunch of keys!" he cried. "Most likely these are what we want first of all."

      "Whose keys are these, and what do they open?" asked the man who was holding Martha by the wrist.

      "They are my father's keys," said Martha, "and they open the different rooms and places downstairs."

      "Do they open the cellar and the strong box in which the money is kept?"

      "One of them is the key of the door at the top of the stairs leading down to the cellar. The key of the door at the bottom of the stairs and the key of the strong-box are not there."

      "In whose possession are those keys?"

      "One pass-key is in the possession of Mr. Jeremiah Wangshaw; the other is in the possession of Mr. Hosea. No one can obtain admission to the cellar during their absence."

      "You will oblige by accompanying us downstairs, and pointing out which keys open certain doors."

      Still holding her by the wrist, but in other respects acting with perfect politeness towards her, the masked man conducted Martha down the wide old staircase till they reached the ground-floor of the Bank, the second man following closely behind. As they went down the lowest flight of stairs, Martha was startled to see a third masked figure — a woman this time, and clothed in a grey mantle from head to foot — who lighted their downward progress with a slender ray from the lantern in her hand. They halted for a moment at the foot of the stairs.

      "Is it not possible," said the leader, to Martha, "that the pass-key of one or both the Brothers Wangshaw may be locked up in the desk in their private office?"

      "It is possible, but not very likely," answered Martha.

      "Still, we may as well ascertain whether such is the case or not."

      At the leader's command, Martha pointed out the key which opened the door of the private office, and then the desk at which the brothers generally sat, one facing the other. A small jet of gas, commonly made use of for melting sealing-wax, was now lighted — a greater light might have betrayed them to some passer-by in the street; a bag, containing a number of housebreaking implements, swathed in flannel, was next produced; and after five minutes' careful manipulation by the second man of the two implements selected by him from the rest, the desks of both the brothers were forced open, and their contents laid bare. There was no key in either of them. A very brief examination sufficed to convince the leader of that fact. With a muttered oath, he turned away.

      "Five minutes' honest labour lost," he said. "We must now try the gently persuasive power of our flannel-clothed friends here. I have never yet known them to fail."

      Then, still holding Martha by the wrist, he led the way out of the office, and along the corridor that led to the heavy oaken door, thickly studded with iron bolts, which opened on to the flight of stairs. by which access was had to the cellar. As before, he requested Martha to point out the proper key; and, as before, Martha complied. Farther than this the keys would not aid them. The door yielded readily, falling back of its own accord as the bolts were withdrawn, and revealing a gloomy flight of stone stairs, ending in an iron door. Motioning to his second to keep a watchful eye on Martha, the leader took the lantern, and descended the steps. He reappeared in the course of a couple of minutes, and led the way back to the private office without a word. Once there, he turned and spoke to Martha.

      "I must compliment you on your sensible conduct in this affair," he said. "Now, however, you must be left to your own reflections for a while. Excuse me if, before I go, I put it out of your power to frustrate my designs, and make a prisoner of you for the next few hours. What has to be done shall be done with as much regard for your comfort as is possible under the circumstances. Chère amie, the cord."

      The last sentence was addressed to the masked woman, who, up to this time, had been a mere looker-on. Now, however, she started into sudden activity. In obedience to a sign from the leader, she placed Martha with her back to a large iron pillar which supported the roof of the office. From some hidden pocket she next produced a coil of long, thin cord, and with it proceeded to tie Martha firmly to the pillar. Her arms were left at liberty till the last. When all else was done, they were fastened together at the wrists with a band of some strong woven stuff, which held them as surely as if they had been gyved with iron.

      "To have fastened your arms down to your sides for a couple of hours would have been a refinement of cruelty of which, in your case, I have no wish to be guilty," said this Grandison of housebreakers. "One little point still remains. You must give me your word that you will not cry out, or call in any way for assistance, otherwise I shall be under the unpleasant necessity of having you gagged. If you give me your word, I have sufficient confidence in you to believe that you will keep it. How say you? Is your tongue to be made a prisoner, or no?"

      "I give you my word not to cry out or create any alarm by calling for help," said Martha, after a few moments' silent thought.

      "That is enough. I trust you."

      Another moment, and Martha was alone.

      As before stated, the room in which the girl was confined was the private office of Wangshaw Brothers. It was a comfortable room. The floor was covered with a faded Turkey carpet, and the old-fashioned mahogany fittings were almost black with age. The only light at present was that given by the small gas-jet before mentioned. It was just sufficient to enable Martha to make out the familiar features of the room.

      She began to breathe more freely as soon as she was left alone. The first shock to her nerves had been a severe one; but when she saw that no real harm was intended her so long as she obeyed the orders of her captors, her composure had quickly returned; and now a warm flush of hope ran through her at the thought that there was just a faint possibility of escape. But she quickly found, when she tried to free herself from her bonds, that she had underrated the skill of the woman who had tied her to the pillar. She was as absolutely helpless as a child of a year old would have been under similar circumstances. Again and again, with desperate energy, she struggled to free herself; but the sole result, as it seemed, was to make her bonds faster than before. It is true that her arms were partly at liberty, but her wrists were so firmly tied together as to render her hands completely useless. The last flicker of hope died out in her heart, and she resigned herself with bitter patience to her fate.

      She had little fear that the burglars would succeed in reaching the secret golden store of Wangshaw Brothers. Before they could touch a single sovereign they must force open two iron doors of immense strength. These doors Martha had always been taught to look upon as impregnable; and she smiled to herself to think how utterly futile the efforts of the two masked men would be. She knew nothing of those modern improvements in the science of housebreaking which would seem to make light of the strongest safes that can be constructed.

      When Martha had fully made up her mind that it was impossible for her to escape, she set about calculating how long her imprisonment was likely to last. It was now about half-past one, A.M., and at ten o'clock Will Trafford would be here to spend his Christmas Day at the Bank. If not set at liberty before that time — and she could hardly hope to be so, seeing that the burglars would require some time to get clear away after leaving the Bank — she might calculate upon being released on the arrival of her sweetheart. He would naturally be surprised at finding his summons unanswered, an alarm would be raised, and finally she, Martha, would be discovered, and set at liberty. But eight hours and a half of imprisonment — and such imprisonment! — was a long and dreadful time to look forward to. This thought was still in her head when the masked woman came gliding noiselessly into the office, with the intention of seeing that her prisoner was still safe. The readjustment of a knot or two satisfied her.

      "You have been trying to escape, and you have found that you cannot," she said, as she turned to go. "Take my advice, and rest quietly. At such a time as this we do not stick at trifles."

      "Who can the woman be?" asked Martha of herself. "What a strange thing for a female to be mixed up in such an affair!"

      More dreary minutes passed: how many she could not have told. She was dreadfully cramped, and the cord by which she was fastened seemed biting into her very flesh. All ordinary thoughts were being gradually swallowed up in a pain that with every minute was becoming more unbearable. It was all that she could do to refrain from crying aloud. She bit her under lip in her agony, and moaned below her breath; but there was no one to hear her. Suddenly, when her torture was at the sharpest, there flashed into her brain a thought so startling, so unexpected, that for a moment her every pain was deadened in the rush of utter surprise with which it overwhelmed her.

      There had been revealed to her at one glance a sure and speedy mode of escape.

      She stood for a few seconds almost breathless, trying to steady her brain. Yes there it was before her very eyes, a sure and speedy mode of escape, but not a painless one. Anything but a painless one, indeed, but still one that must be carried out at all costs to herself. She was in torture already; and that other torture which she must undergo for the sake of liberty might be sharper, perhaps, but it would soon be over. But she would not give herself time to argue the point, lest her courage should fail her. She would put herself to the immediate proof.

      The pillar to which Martha was tied was within a yard of the desk that had been broken open. Close to the edge of this desk was the upright gaspipe from which sprang the small jet, still alight, of which mention has already been made. By stretching out her arms, Martha could reach this jet. She could do more than that: she could hold her wrists over it, and let the flame burn away the band by which they were fastened together; and her hands once at liberty, the rest would quickly follow. This was the method of escape that had flashed like an inspiration across her brain, and she now proceeded to put it in operation.

      She drew in her breath, and locked her teeth, and pushed out her hands with a quick movement, and so held them extended while the jet of flame played on her wrists and on the band that held them together. She shut her eyes involuntarily, and her eyebrows came together in a frown of agony. The tiny jet played lightly against the band that held her, which presently burst into a flame. Even then she did not falter. Her arms might have been made of steel, so fixed and rigid were they, so sternly was she bent on accomplishing the thing she had set herself to do. In a few moments — moments that to her seemed hours — the blazing ligature gave way, curling itself swiftly back like a burning serpent, and her hands were free.

      Her hands were free, and they fell helplessly by her sides. She gave utterance to a long sigh — a sigh that was half a sob; then her chin drooped on her breast, and for a little while she knew nothing.

      Martha's return to her senses was quickened by the pain from which she was still suffering. After one bewildered glance round, she came back to a knowledge of her true situation, and of the peril that was still before her. With a great effort of will she pulled herself together, and, despite her pain, began, with quick and nimble fingers, to unloosen one of the knots in the cord by which she was fastened. This offered no long opposition to her efforts; and the first knot unloosened, the rest quickly followed. In two minutes more, Martha Backhouse was a free woman. A deep, silent thanksgiving went up from her heart as the last fold of cord dropped to the floor.

      She was so cramped by her bonds that for a little while she was unable to move. She stood thinking, as well as the torture she was in would allow her to think. Hitherto she had had no thought except how to free herself; but now that fact was accomplished, what ought her next move to be? She was still far from being out of peril. The masked woman might come back at any moment, and discover all. In that case would her life be worth a moment's purchase? Evidently the first thing to do, if such a thing were possible, was to make her escape from the Bank without alarming the thieves in the bullion cellar. The next thing was to raise an alarm, and endeavour to effect their capture before they had time to get clear away with their booty. If only those two great objects could be combined! The thought thrilled her heart through and through.

      She stooped and took off her shoes without as much noise as would have frightened a mouse. Then she stood listening for a moment, with all her senses on the alert. There was a noise of voices, broken, faint, and hollow, with now and then a dull, solid thud, like the muffled blow of some heavy implement. They were still in the cellar, then, and their task as yet was unaccomplished.

      Step by step, and silent as a shadow, she crept out of the office, and so along the passage leading to the cellar. A faint light, which shone up the cellar-stairs, and was reflected on the opposite wall of the corridor, betrayed where the nefarious work was still going on. Towards this light Martha now crept with a sort of stealthy swiftness. When she had reached the edge of it, she stood for a moment and listened. Then, keeping her body well out of sight, she protruded her head within the line of light, and looked. Her gaze went down the stone staircase and into the cellar. The iron-door at the foot of the stairs had been forced open, and the thieves were now busy with the great safe itself. Various housebreaking implements were scattered about the floor. One of the men was busy with a crowbar, swathed in flannel, which he was using as a lever to force open one of the doors of the safe. The second man was busy drilling holes in another door with a strange-looking implement, the like of which Martha had never seen before. The woman was lighting these operations with a lamp, held aloft in one of her hands. All three were standing with their backs to the staircase. Martha's eyes took in the entire picture at a glance.

      There was one thing besides which they took in — to wit, the bunch of keys with which she had opened the door at the top of the stairs. This bunch of keys was now lying on the landing at the bottom of the stairs, close to the iron-door. Could she but obtain possession of it, she saw, not only a way of escape for herself, but a way by which the thieves might be caught in their own trap. But to obtain possession of the keys without disturbing the thieves was the one difficult thing to do. There was only one mode of obtaining them, and that was to fetch them. But to do this unseen and unheard, seemed at the first glance utterly impossible. At the second glance it seemed a little more feasible, but still a dangerous thing to do. Nevertheless, she at once. made up her mind that it must be attempted. Fortunately, the broken door at the foot of the stairs had not been pushed quite back to the wall, in consequence of which its bulk now intercepted part of the light of the lamp held by the woman, so that that portion of the landing which was behind the door lay in deep shadow, and this shadow extended itself in a narrow strip from the bottom of the stairs to the top. It was down this strip of blackness, herself a moving shadow, that Martha now began to glide on her dangerous errand. Fortunately, her dress was a dark one, and her feet were unshod. Her sole chance of safety lay in the fact of the three people below stairs being so intently occupied that they would neither see nor hear her; and Martha judged that they were so occupied, because, for the last few minutes, conversation among themselves had almost entirely ceased. The grand crisis of their labours was evidently at hand.

      With her back and hands pressed close to the wall, so as to keep herself within as small a space as possible, and with the skirts of her dress kept close about her, Martha began to move slowly down the stairs.

      Her face was very white, but filled with a fine resolution. From her present position the inmates of the cellar were not visible to her; but both eyes and ears were painfully on the alert, and they told her that so far everything was safe. By an inch at a time, as it seemed, and so slowly that her advance was almost imperceptible, Martha kept descending steadily. In all there were fifteen stairs to go down she had counted them many a time; and as each one was now cleared and left behind, her heart gave a little extra throb, and she felt that by so much was her task nearer completion, and that by so much had her danger become more imminent. When a dozen stairs had been passed in safety, she paused for a moment or two in her progress. The beating of her heart sounded so unnaturally loud and strange in her own ears, that she was afraid those in the cellar would hear it too. But in a little while her heart grew stiller, her fainting resolution revived, and she moved onward again.

      Thirteen. Fourteen. Fifteen. The first part of her task was over. She stood at the foot of the stairs, the iron-door close beside her, the bunch of keys within half a yard of her feet. The next difficult thing to do was to pick up the keys, which were threaded on a steel ring, without being heard by the thieves. She was just on the point of stooping to make the attempt when the woman inside the cellar spoke.

      "You must do without me for a minute or two, Fred," she said, "while I go and look after my prisoner."

      She set down her lamp, and had got so far on her way upstairs that, by putting out a hand, Martha could have touched her dress, when the harsh voice of the man recalled her.

      "Your prisoner is quite safe," he said, "and I cannot spare you just now. You must hold the light for a few minutes longer: I cannot get on without you."

      The woman went back, and Martha breathed again.

      Now or never. Martha stooped, and put out her hand with a quick, stealthy movement, and felt the keys between her fingers. How to gather them, and lift them off the ground without making the slightest. noise? Even this difficulty was conquered at last. The hand holding the keys was drawn back into shadow, and still there was no alarm. The remainder of her task seemed easy. It was only to get back undetected to the top of the stairs. She was going back slowly, but not as slowly as she had come down, and had accomplished about one-third of the return journey, when an exclamation from one of the men below told her that she had not an instant to lose, and that she had better make a rush for safety.

      "The keys! Where are the keys?" he exclaimed, having turned round instinctively, as it were: "They were here not five minutes ago."

      As he sprang forward, Martha, no longer hidden, made a rush up the remaining stairs. At this apparition he stopped point blank in sheer amazement. The second man, more quick-witted than his comrade, drew a pistol from his belt, and fired. Martha had just put her foot on the top step when she felt something strike her sharply on the shoulder. She staggered forward into the corridor, wheeled quickly round, and flung herself — head, arms, body — against the oaken door, which, yielding to her strength, turned on its well-oiled hinges, and, with a little triumphant click, as its spring-bolt shot home, shut up, as in a trap, the three thieves below.

      Without the key, this door, which locked of itself when pushed to, could be opened neither from one side nor the other; with the key, it could be opened on either side. Hence the necessity for Martha to obtain, at every risk, the bunch of keys, which, besides several others, contained the particular one that belonged to the oaken door. The door had scarcely been shut a second, as it seemed, before the two men inside began tearing and beating at it like madmen, trying to escape. Their language made Martha shudder and stuff her fingers into her ears. Now that the door was shut, she was completely in the dark; and so, with her fingers still in her ears, she ran along the corridor and back into the private office, where the small gas-jet was still burning.

      She stood here for a moment or two like one bewildered, staring helplessly about her, not knowing which way to turn next. She felt an odd, numb sensation in her left shoulder. She put her hand up to it, and withdrew it, marked with blood. This was almost more than she could bear, and only the strong sense there was upon her of a duty unfulfilled kept her from fainting. Still holding her bunch of keys, she went out of the office and down a passage that led to the side entrance. She was trembling now, and had scarcely strength enough to unfasten the heavy door. At last it was open. She flitted out, and sped down the street in search of assistance. On reaching the first corner, she nearly stumbled into the arms of a constable, who was coming the opposite way. What sort of an incoherent story she told him she could never afterwards remember; but it must have been to the purpose.

      No one could have been more surprised than Martha herself was, when she came to her senses, to learn that the thieves were none other than a certain soi-disant Captain Bromley, his wife, and his servant, who, some four months previously, had become the tenants of an empty house that stood next door to the bank. They were complete strangers in the town, and the only person whose acquaintance they seemed to cultivate was Mr. Harry Dacres, the junior clerk. The reason of this came out at the examination of the prisoners. From that garrulous but simple young gentleman the sham captain had obtained certain information respecting the bank — its offices, its cellars, the position of its safes, the mode and time of locking up, &c. — all of which was needful for the successful working of his deep-laid scheme. The telegram to Matthew Backhouse was simply a ruse to get the old man out of the way. An examination of the premises at once revealed Captain Bromley's reasons for locating himself so close to the bank. A portion of the brickwork in the cellar of the house tenanted by him had been taken down, and an excavation made through the few feet of earth that intervened between it and the Bank cellars. Everything had been so well arranged that the displacement of a few bricks on Christmas Eve was all that was required to introduce the thieves into the bank premises. The rest we know. On the trial it came out that the so-called captain was an old offender: a man originally of good education and attainments, but who, years ago, had gone irrecoverably to the bad.

      Martha's wound was not a dangerous one, but her nerves had been severely shaken, and some time elapsed before she thoroughly recovered from the effects of that terrible night. She and Will Trafford were married in the course of the following autumn. The bride was given away by the elder brother of the firm. A stool in the Bank was offered to Will, and accepted by him. In the course of the years that have gone by since that time, he has risen to be the most confidential and trusted servant of Wangshaw Brothers.

      Mr. Harry Dacres never reappeared at the bank. When he heard of what had happened, he at once sent in his resignation, with a letter expressive of his deep regret; and then, without waiting for an answer, he set off to join a brother in America.